


Wouldn't Hurt A Fly

by TheDVirus



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Angst and Fluff and Smut, Angst with a Happy Ending, Arkham Asylum, Blow Jobs, Comfort/Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Smut, Hallucinations, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Madness, Male Slash, Masturbation, Nygmobblepot, Nygmobblepot Week 2017, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-15
Updated: 2017-03-15
Packaged: 2018-10-05 19:05:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10314968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDVirus/pseuds/TheDVirus
Summary: Third Fic for Nygmobblepot Week, Prompt: 'Arkham'.Takes place at the start of Season 3. Ed is one puzzle the Arkham psychiatrists will never solve but when it all gets too much, comfort can be found in the unlikeliest of places.Contains references to Alfred Hitchcock's 'Psycho'.





	

Ed spat blood out of his mouth as he heard his cell door slam shut.  
He wiped his chin with the back of his shirt sleeve and frowned at the red now staining the stripes.  
The guards had not been gentle.  
Then again, he had just assaulted a psychiatrist and, since it was his first violent outburst, maybe an extra show of force was protocol? A deterrent to discourage further disobedience.  
He got up gingerly from where they had thrown him and winced as he felt his limbs ache from where they had made contact with the cold floor.  
He limped to his sink and washed his face, the freezing water hurting the freshly forming bruises around his eyes. He was just grateful that his glasses, sitting safely on the side of the sink had been spared any trauma. He had no idea how to go about getting a replacement pair while incarcerated and he was fairly certain the guards weren’t keen to do him any favours.

Since Hugo Strange’s disappearance and the escape of his ‘pet projects’, there was more pressure than ever from city officials to prove Arkham was a viable metal health facility, not the playground of a mad scientist.  
The only changes Ed had noticed were more armed guard patrols, the removal of anything deemed too ‘stimulating’ from the common area (such as the ancient magazines littered around the tables or the insidious lure of the finger paint sets) and a marked restriction on ‘outdoor’ time which now involved a supervised circuit around the main building before heading back inside rather than an hour spent outside cooped up in a wire mesh yard.  
That was alright though, Ed had simply made his own entertainment, usually at the expense of others.  
What else did he have to look forward to?

As he reached for a nearby damp smelling towel to dry his now clean yet aching face, he mentally answered his own question.  
Oswald’s weekly visits.  
The one time he was treated like a human being, not an animal in a zoo or a science experiment. It was unsettling to see people in white coats try to figure you out, to cram you into a shape that fit with their hypotheses.  
Ed was used to being a puzzle to those around him but did not appreciate trying to be solved.

Dr Bartholomew had been trying to solve him every day for the last four weeks.  
He was the kind of person who would complete a jigsaw by cutting all the irregular pieces into squares then lining them up just so they would fit the way he wanted. A cheater going for half assed yet easy solutions that he could dress up and present as ‘groundbreaking’.  
Ed had detested him immediately.  
Mainly because Dr Bartholomew had considered Ed an easy fix. After all he wasn’t a cannibal, a compulsive masturbator or a tailor specializing in human skin like some of the other inmates. Ed was a model patient with no violent outbursts who responded well to instruction. Bartholomew mistook Ed’s innate survival instinct for weakness.  
His brilliant theory was that Ed had been led down the path of evil by The Penguin, conveniently ignoring that Ed’s first murders had occurred before they had spent any real time together. If he had acknowledged this fact, his theory wouldn’t have made sense and he couldn’t write a tell-all book based on a theory that didn’t fit could he?

‘After all Edward’, he had said during their session that day, ‘You were a good man. You had a good job, friends, a place to live. Why would you decide to throw that all away?’

 _‘Friends'._  
Ed had found the use of the word amusing. It implied a close emotional connection. Not a strained tolerance, pitying glances or uncomfortable silences.  
You couldn’t throw away something you had never possessed. 

‘I don’t know’, he lied.

‘You wouldn’t. My point exactly’.

‘I didn’t say that‘, Ed grumbled but Dr Bartholomew wasn’t listening anyway.

‘Then this criminal shows up and takes advantage of your kindness and manipulates you into becoming every bit as bad as he is’.

‘He didn’t take ad-‘

‘All you wanted was a bit of respect Edward’, Bartholomew interjected, ‘A bit of consideration and appreciation of your talents. Many people understand those feelings. But murder is not the right way to get attention. You know that don’t you?’

He looked at Ed patronisingly over his glasses like a stern yet kindly headmaster.  
Ed didn’t respond. What was the point?  
He felt like Giordano Bruno standing bound to the stake. It didn’t matter how often he said that Oswald was the only person who had ever treated him as a friend instead of a curiosity or an annoyance. It didn’t matter how he described the dinners they had shared, the jokes they had both laughed at or Ed’s anger at how Arkham had done its utmost to destroy Oswald in the name of ‘mental health’. Bartholomew wasn’t interested in the opinions of lab rats: not even those who could present evidence to substantiate their claims.

‘Shall we have our riddle now?’ Bartholomew asked, smile on his face showing he thought he had just offered Ed some kind of wonderful gift.

Ed fought the urge to roll his eyes. Bartholomew had begun to include a riddle in each one of their sessions as positive reinforcement: something Ed could look forward to. Ed saw it for what it was: a fishing lure. Something to convince him to bite, to inadvertently give away secrets.  
Well, if Bartholomew wanted an insight into Ed’s brain, he’d give him one.  
Up to this point, he had always asked easy riddles just to spite the ‘Doctor’ and get the segment over and done with.  
Perhaps it was time for a change of tack?

‘What goes on four legs in the morning, two legs in the afternoon and three legs at night?’ he asked.

‘Now, now, no need to go easy on me’, Bartholomew chuckled knowingly, ‘The Riddle of the Sphinx: an oldie but a goodie. The answer is ‘man’.

Ed mimicked the noise of a gameshow buzzer and smirked when he saw Bartholomew’s incredulous face.

‘Incorrect’, he pronounced.

‘No its not’, Bartholomew said, his voice betraying his irritation despite his neutral expression, ‘Four legs is a human being as a baby, two legs is a human as an adult and three is an aging individual who walks with a cane’.

‘The answer is a ‘baby’’, Ed replied, grinning wickedly, ‘At first it crawls but cut off two legs and it doesn’t crawl any more. Give it a crutch and, voila, three legged baby’.

‘Why would you make such a sick joke?’ Bartholomew asked, lip curling in disgust.

‘That question’s easy to answer’, Ed said, leaning forward, ‘It’s not my baby’.

‘That’s enough riddles I think’, Bartholomew said testily, looking over his notes.

Ed leant back in his chair, heart leaping at his success.  
He had wrong footed Bartholomew just as planned! Hopefully there would be no more idiotic questions now that-

‘Did you and Mr Cobblepot have a sexual relationship Edward?’

Ed wasn’t sure he had heard him correctly.

‘What?’ Ed deadpanned.

‘Did he ever touch you without your consent?’

‘No!’ Ed retorted.

He watched Bartholomew write something down on his notepad and knew he didn’t believe him. He felt his nails cut into the backs of his hands where he had clasped them beneath the table. Ed didn’t care what the doctor thought of him but the thought of him labelling Oswald in such a negative way sickened him.

 _‘With_ your consent?’ Bartholomew probed.

Ed was seething at this point. He hated this man. Hated him more than Jim Gordon. At least Gordon was competent at his job! 

‘It’s alright, you don’t have to answer me’, Bartholomew said soothingly.

‘Then why even ask me the question you ignoramus?!’ Ed snapped, losing his temper at the faux sympathy in Bartholomew’s voice, ‘Do you even need me to be here for these sessions you old quack?! Considering you already seem to think you know everything?!’

Bartholomew inhaled slowly and removed his glasses. He gave them a quick clean before replacing them.

‘I think it might be best if we put a stop to Mr Cobblepot’s visits’, he said with just the hint of a smirk.

‘No!’ Ed cried, leaping to his feet, ‘You can’t do that!’

‘Sit down Ed’, Bartholomew chided impatiently.

Ed threw his chair across the room. It smacked against the wall and hit the floor.

‘Only he calls me ‘Ed’!’ Ed shouted, ‘You haven’t earned that right!’

Bartholomew waved a hand at the one way glass partition built into the wall to signal the guards outside the office that he was in control.  
That made Ed angrier.

‘Alright Mr Nygma’, he said, coldly and gestured to the chair, ‘I won’t ask again’.

Ed, heart racing with fury and with teeth gritted so hard he thought they would splinter, retrieved his chair and sat back down. He placed his hands on the tabletop, fingers spread wide as he tried to calm himself. 

_‘He who angered you conquered you’_ was the old adage. He was not going to give this sanctimonious bastard any more satisfaction.

‘See? This is what I’m talking about’, Bartholomew said wearily, ‘You see how agitated it makes you when we talk about him?’

Ed saw right through Bartholomew’s ‘concerned’ expression. This was about power, not treatment. Ed had snapped at him so now he was taking away his treat. That was what it had always been about. Bartholomew was trying to cure Ed when there was nothing wrong with him!

It’s not conducive to your therapy to be around a certified psychopath and a common criminal at that’.

‘What did you just call him?’ Ed asked quietly.

‘A psychopath and a common criminal. Such a shame his treatment didn’t take root. Early results by all accounts were very promis-‘

Ed couldn’t remember exactly what happened next but he liked to think it had been a learning experience for Dr Bartholomew.  
He didn’t remember leaping over the desk or grabbing him by the throat. He remembered punching him in the face over and over: the bruises on his aching knuckles were physical proof of that. As was the blood that had splattered onto his prison uniform. He remembered the odd whistling noise the gasping doctor had made when Ed had knocked some of his teeth out then a blunt thud to the back of his own head as the guards had stormed into the room.  
The last image burnt into his brain were the hundreds of glass eyes belonging to the taxidermy birds Dr Bartholomew kept arranged on his shelves staring down at him.

 _‘Just like Oswald’_ , he remembered thinking, _‘That’s what you want to do to me. Rip my heart out and make sure I never fly again’_.

 

He lay down on his bed and curled up into a foetal position. His hands were shaking as he rubbed them. 

‘You really shouldn’t have hurt him’.

Ed looked up to see Oswald sitting beside him on the bed, looking down at him with gentle eyes.

‘I couldn’t let him talk about you like that’, Ed said thickly.

He felt Oswald caress his hair and sighed sorrowfully as he reflected on how his little ‘outburst’ had probably cost him his visits with Oswald altogether.

‘But, they hurt _you_ ’, Oswald said quietly, ‘Let me make it better’.

Ed didn’t resist as Oswald manoeuvred him onto his back or took down his trousers. Oswald positioned himself so he was on top of Ed and reached into Ed’s boxers.  
As Ed’s cock was exposed to the air, Oswald lowered himself down and began to kiss it, dry lips gently pecking at Ed’s member from base to tip. Once he reached the tip, he began to lick it like an ice cream, his clever pink tongue dancing over the head.  
Ed’s breath hitched as he felt himself grow erect, Oswald following his member diligently as it straightened with his feather light ministrations. 

‘Oswald’, he breathed longingly and reaching down, tickled the back of Oswald’s neck, just beneath his hairline. 

Oswald hummed around his cock in appreciation and enveloped Ed’s head in his mouth as a reward.  
Ed sighed as he felt Oswald’s hot tongue lathe the tip before coiling around his cock, loosely stroking it up and down.  
Meanwhile, the fingers of Oswald’s left hand kneaded his balls as he encircled the base of Ed’s cock with the ring finger and thumb of his other hand.  
Ed looked down at the display and smiled at the sight of Oswald’s head bobbing and down as he began to suck him off.  
Oswald sensed his eyes on him and looked up, a mischievous glint in his pale eyes.

‘I missed you’, Ed whispered.

Oswald, as if to prove how much he missed Ed, began to suck harder while simultaneously stroking the base of his cock with his right hand.  
Ed’s hips bucked at the sensation and he licked his chaffed lips with satisfaction. As Oswald took in more and more of him, he subtly bucked his hips in time with Oswald’s head driving deeper into his mouth.  
Oswald purred at Ed’s eagerness and used his tongue like a whip, flicking it over Ed’s head. Each time Ed felt that gorgeous tongue touch his head, he saw stars behind his eyelids.

‘God, you make me feel so _fucking_ good!’ he growled, ‘Faster! Oh _God_ , faster! _Harder!_ Please!’

Oswald took the hint and gripping Ed’s cock firmly, began to pump with his hand, continuing to stimulate him with his mouth.  
Ed’s knees clenched and he grabbed a handful of blanket on impulse while the quivering fingers of his other hand reached for Oswald’s hair.  
He felt like he was going to explode!

‘Re-ready?’ he breathlessly asked Oswald, fingers clasping his hair firmly.

Oswald looked up at him slowly, without releasing his cock, and raised an eyebrow invitingly.

‘Fu— _fu-ck!_ ’ Ed gasped and brutally shoved his cock upwards into Oswald’s waiting mouth. 

He felt Oswald swallow around it and that was all it took.  
He came explosively, feeling cum hit his stomach despite Oswald’s waiting mouth.  
He lay there, sweat dripping down his forehead and spine tingling as he felt Oswald daintily lick him clean. He felt exhausted but exhilarated: his heartache replaced by the numbing warmth of the afterglow.  
He leant into Oswald’s touch as he felt fingers grace his cheek lovingly.

‘Oswald, I I lo-‘ he began but opening his eyes, he saw he was alone.

In one hand, he held the tissue he had been using to clean himself.  
The other was on his own cheek.  
Oswald had never been there. Of course he hadn’t.

Ed sat up numbly, wrinkling his nose in distaste as he threw the dirty tissue away.  
He tried to ignore the empty ache rising in his chest as he wiped his forehead clean of sweat.  
Had it been a hallucination? Or a wet dream?  
He decided in the same moment it didn’t matter.  
The point was it had ended.  
What was that old line?

‘We all go a little mad sometimes’, Ed quoted.

But why couldn’t ‘sometimes’ last a little longer?

The sound of footsteps in the hall outside his cell and the rattle of keys made him leap up and hastily pull up his trousers. The door swung open just as he had finished fixing his dishevelled appearance.  
Blinking as light flooded in from the hallway, Ed was surprised to see the Warden standing in the open doorway, flanked by two armed guards.  
Ed braced himself for a fight but no amount of preparation could have prevented him from what came next.

‘Good news Mr Nygma’, the Warden beamed, ‘You’re being released’.


End file.
